This is gonna be long, ya can't rush a sea story. She was a Siren, sure enough. You remember how Odysseus was warned by Circe about the beautiful Sirens whose appearance and song lured mariners to their doom on the rocks. He plugged his crew's ears with wax and tied himself to the mast, and got away with it. Circe is never around when I need her. She didn't warn me. This one didn't sing, didn't have to. She laughed. How to start. Arma virumque cano? Nah, it's been done. How 'bout; It was a sparkling new day on the Song Nha Be in late 1968. We were heading south from Cat Lai to the big oil port at Nha Be on some trivial errand now long forgotten. I was 21, a brand new Sergeant commanding an Army LCM-8 landing craft. She was 73 feet overall, 65 tons, four GMC 6-71 engines of 165 HP each, driving two shafts, and could do 12 knots on a good day. She was designed to carry a 60 ton main battle tank from ship to shore, the one thing we never did. We carried cargo, towed ammo barges, and worked tactically with Infantry. I preferred the latter, and my boat, together with Sgt. Phil Layton's 17 boat were soon to be attached semi-permanently to the 199th Light Infantry Brigade, but that's another epic. (Layton sure as hell is, Aeneas? Hmmm.) The river was too wide to be shot at, and the throttles were firewalled. All plain sail to the royals...(Hey, Redhawk, get a grip..OK OK). Being 21, I had devised a unique way of coming alongside a pier. I would head straight for the pier at full speed. When those on the pier started running from the impact point, grabbing stanchions and bollards, I would come full astern on the outboard shaft, apply full rudder in the same direction, and the boat would give a massive shudder, spin parallel to the pier, and slide sideways on her flat bottom into the berth. Impressive, I thought. Maybe they would name it after me; "The Redhawk Flying Moor". You have to be 21 to think this kind of thing is a good idea. There was, as always, a British tanker tied to the big "T" pier at Nha Be, discharging fuel. I was unaware that the chief officers in these ships were allowed to bring their wives along, and that the Far East attracted the younger officers (and wives). We swept around under her counter, all four engines still at "four bells and a jingle", too close and too fast, her "Red Duster" flapping literally overhead, when the fates took control. She stood up, a 25ish apparition in a bikini. Actually, half a bikini, as she neglected to secure the top. She came to the rail, and leaned well over to get (and give) the best possible view. Let me say that there was no doubt of this Siren's membership in the Mammallian order. Her babies would never go hungry! We were unused to this, the Vietnamese women are among the world's most beautiful, but this is a league in which they did not compete. My crew of five, and I stood rooted, open mouthed, staring upward. Odysseus tied to his mast was no more immobile. The boat charged on, unheeded. Finally, the mental alarms of impending doom penetrated, and I regained conciousness, ten meters from the pier, still doing 12 knots. 12 knots don't sound like much. It's 243 inches per second! 12,000 ton/ foot/ seconds of kinetic energy. I slammed both shafts into full reverse, and, as they always do if you don't pause in neutral, all four engines petulantly quit in a gout of black exhaust smoke. In the sudden silence, I heard her laugh, gales of laughter, the tinkling of celestial crystal, drowned out after a second or two by the screech of the steel bow ramp impacting the concrete pier. You can't destroy energy, not this much, and it had to go somewhere. The sloped ramp climbed the pier, 60 tons of boat defying gravity, passing an unbelievable angle on its way to an impossible one. Something had to give, and the pier did, the bow crashing down through a cloud of crushed concrete. I remember thinking that this is just how an icebreaker does it. Took about a twenty-ton bite. Put a few scrapes in the ramp, Andy Higgins built them tough. If I was trying to be the center of attention, I achieved it, MP's, White Mice, Dock bosses, then later S-5 officers, JAG's and such. There were hints of courts martial. I claimed my reverse had failed, which was quite true, if not the entire story, and ran off to hide with the Infantry. JAG's don't go there. It all falls into the category;"Someday we'll all laugh about this, then nervously change the subject." The Siren, I suppose, is sixty-something now, pruning roses somewhere in the Happy Isles. I remember her laugh. Redhawk34
"I always carry whiskey, in case of snakebite.
I also carry a snake"
W.C. Fields
The best way to deal with a snake is to cut off its tail, about a half-inch
behind its ears. Actually, I had little trouble with "Mr. No-Shoulders" as
I had a pet mongoose, name of Mort, who had the run of the boat. 'Cept that
the Vietnamese kids would go looking for snakes to toss into the welldeck
to watch him do his mongoose thing. He was undefeated in fifty fights. One
kid actually showed up spinning a dusty krait by its tail, so it couldn't
bite. Good thing, we called that one the "two stepper".
Mort liked to cuddle up against someone to take a nap, and on one night as
black as Bill Gates heart, he got down among fifty grunts in the welldeck
and cuddled up to a half-asleep rifleman. This stalwart took him for a
rat(Mort was highly insulted), and let out a shriek, the grunts started
running around' whoopin' and hollerin', Mort thought this was great fun,
and was running around underfoot. (You can't step on a mongoose, too fast.)
I'm drivin' along mindin' my own bidness, and I suddenly have a full-blown
riot going on. Whas' happenin'? Mutiny? Barratry? Armed insurrection? Mad
Grunt disease?
I turned over the wheel and jumped down into the welldeck, just as Mort
capered by, chasing a half-dozen of the 199th's finest before him. I caught
one young Audie Murphy jacking a round into his M-16. I knocked the barrel
up and shouted," whaddaya plan to do if you miss, throw a grenade?"
I collected Mort, who was well ahead on points, and knew it. He rode my
shoulder back to the wheelhouse, gave his victory chitter, and curled up to
sleep beside me while I tried to figure out how to report this one.
Log Entry:
"Plt night patrol FSB Charlie to Bien Dinh & return. No contact."
Redhawk34
So there we were, at Blackhorse, just in from two
disastrous weeks in the field, and both nervous as hell
and thankful we could take a shower, eat in a messhall,
and have a place to hide from pulling shit burning detail.
But that's another story.
When who should appear in the barracks, but Captain Balderson, with too much time on his hands and no mission to pursue! What to do, what to do? Ah, send the men out to the firing range with old ammo! Brilliant! We needed practice shooting! After those two weeks most of us didn't have rifling left in our barrels.
And Sergeant Sanchez made the mistake of being the only E-7 within grabbing range. The perfect candidate to oversee this little detail. Sanchez remains the only Grunt I know who to lose his gear in one day long firefight, complete with his money for R and R next week, and get it back in another fight two days later. And that's another story.
Off we went, in a not so very good mood, the ARVN's, their wives, and their kids watching us trudge along in the heat and bright sun. What was it the Indians said about the British, "Only mad dogs and Englishmen..."
Things went fine until Sanchez picked up one of the LAWS that the CO had sent along for us to dispose of as 'too old'. Define, 'too old'. It seems the Sergeant had never fired one.
"How do you fire this he says?" and one of my buddies, his name and face lost in the fog of history, gives him a badly instructed lesson.
"Well, first you remove this pin", he says, "then, you grab it here and here and you pull on it to extend it." Sanchez took to that like a duck..., but I digress. "Now, you put it on your shoulder, you sight through this thingamajig, pick a target and fire."
Sanchez tilts the LAW at a diagonal on his shoulder, the business end of the weapon pointing toward the ground scant feet in front of us, his left hand grasping the front of the weapon, the fingers of his right hand on the rubber covered trigger, and says in a voice no one there will ever forget, "but how do you fire it?" as he proceeds to squeeze the trigger.
In a flash and a roar we were both blinded and deafened as the LAW discharged into the ground, the back-blast aimed harmlessly up into the heavens. Many an Olympic sprint record fell that day, but alas, too far from any chronometer to be clocked, as grunts up and down the range made themselves like ultrathin pantyhose on sweet mother earth.
Fortunately for all present, the projectile didn't go far enough to arm and simply disappeared into the earth leaving us all shell shocked but unscathed and not just a little pissed off.
And Sanchez, never a man to be topped in a story, looks around at those of us flat on the earth, and says in a loud voice to the deafened silence, with a smile, "Oh," puts the tube on the ground, laughs, and strolls away.
NCOs! It wasn't bad enough the NVA were trying to kill us...
John F. McBride
Alpha, 2nd of the 3rd
April, 1969 - January, 1970
HHC, 2nd of the 3rd
January, 1970 - June, 1970
Gary Lauzen should tell this story, but he's a 'get up and keep moving' kind of guy who doesn't have much patience with keyboards, so I'll tell it for him. Of course, it won't be told as well and it won't be like listening to it at one of our reunions, but then, just tell yourself you'll have the pleasure of the real thing some day and for now settle for the short story instead of the novel.
Once upon a time, a long time ago, in a galaxy, far far away, the 1st platoon of Alpha, 2/3 was out near Highway One, west of Tan Lap and Xuan Loc, RIF'ing by day and ambushing in squads by night. So, Gary's squad finds a likely place with a nice trail running back through the rubber trees where there weren't many critters supposed to be making trails so why is this one here? and they set up, wait for dark, break down, move, and set up again.
The claymore's out, the firing positions established, the watches ordained, the radio protected and the squelch turned way down low, Gary has just settled down for a long winter's sleep so to speak and what to his eyes should appear but the bright nova of a trip flare going off. Gary's the designated frag thrower and before you can ask, "why?", has one in his hand. Meanwhile, the squad is on full auto and tracers are trimming the trees and speeding off into eternity.
About that time, to everyone's consternation, what do they hear, but 'Tank' Tarnowski, screaming in a hoarse, terrified voice that could be heard in the towers on the perimeter of BMB thirty miles distant, "Cease fire! Cease fire! Cease f**king fire!"
But wait! Gary has the pin out and has dropped it, his arm cocked and ready to throw! The firing stops, Gary freezes, Tarnowski peeks out from the scant cover of a sweet rubber tree and proceeds to re-inflate himself as his silhouette rises in front of the trip flare's brilliance. Seems he went out to set up a trip flare and the word didn't get around.
Ah, but there's more!
Now the trip flare has burned out and it is as dark as a black bear at night in a long cave.
Where's the pin for Gary's frag? They search and they search but they can't find it!
They don't want to throw it because they're afraid they'll give away their position! (Ya, of course you wonder that, we all do to every time Gary tells the story - and every time Gary laughs about it, too - give away your position!) But these guys aren't highly trained Grunts for nothing. They scavenge a pin from a smoke grenade, put it in the frag, and the rest of the night pass the smoke from watch to watch until the dawn breaks and they can find the lost pin.
Sure, we laugh about all this stuff now, but it didn't seem so damn funny then, did it. Well, at least not until you were telling it to the rest of the platoon. Since then it, and every other, "it's a wonder more of us didn't get killed!" story of Alpha has become the stuff of legends!
If you think we're laughing about it, imagine how it gets retold by a couple of ancient, wizened, ex-NVA over a couple of warm beers somewhere in Hanoi! Of course, the jokes on them, too, as I have a couple of funny stories to tell about those 'invincible' Ho Chi Minh warriors. But those are other stories!!!
And from John Parker -
Hi gang. Remember when you were a kid and you put a firecracker under a coffee can and watched it soar into the blue. As I tell this story please remember what a great sight that was for a young lad. Anyway, I was the S3 air of the third of the seventh at Fire Support Base Mace. I had set up a handgrenade range just out of the perimeter where we had new guys get acquainted with grenades. As you may recall, a significant percentage of grenades do not go off. And, since I did not want the VC slipping in and making off with potential booby traps, at the end of training I would mold a half stick of C4 around each one, light the time fuse, and get away, We used 55 gallon drums for targets, and as I was lighting the fuse on a dud grenade, I glanced over and saw a 55 gallon drum lying not 2 feet away. Almost instinctively, I stood the drum up and rolled it over the dud. When I got to the jeep, I told the driver to watch the drum. Well, when the dud and the C4 went off, it shredded the drum, but the bottom shot into the air like a lethal Frisbee. It roared straight up for about 400 feet. It then hovered for a second and then came straight at us like a hawk closing in for the kill. We stood there, mesmerized by what was happening when we simultaneously yelled and clambered under the jeep. That thing zoomed past where we were standing then hit the ground, bounced, and rolled for a hundred feet. If there is a moral to this tale it would have to be as follows:
When destroying dud grenades with C4 and time fuse, do not put a 55 gallon drum over it.
John Parker editorjp@springsips.com.
Those of you who were in Cam My when the 199th patrolled
that AO probably remember that there was an old volcanic
cinder cone hill on the edge of the village that made a
great fortified position. When Alpha Company was assigned
there for a week or two in late June and early July, 1969,
there was a platoon of local militia up on the hill inside
a ring of apron wire, concertina, claymores and bunkers.
At night they had great view seats for watching the
village and listening to the communist lectures that
took place in the village on megaphones. I wouldn't add
this just for color unless those of us in Alpha hadn't
heard it happen the first night we were there. When
Captain Balderson asked the Local commander why he didn't
do something about it the translator responded, "Too
dangerous go down night." That particular night that
made a lot of sense to us Grunts and we were really,
really thankful that Balderson, in one of his
few moments of gung-ho weakness decided not to
belabor the point.
Which brings me to my real story. Lt. Colonel Loefke
had put us there to train these guys on the fine art
of war. Now, mind you, that was a big order, and I
won't go into the fine points with one exception which
is the subject of this story. These guys had an old
60 millimeter mortar there and a nice supply of rounds
but they lacked skill. Learning this Balderson
decided to employ the skills of the Lt. and men from
our disbanded weapons platoon and put them to some
work other than humping like the rest of us.
So one afternoon between Monsoon storms the Lt. and
several of his guys help the Locals haul out the mortar
and rounds and the show....er, lesson began. Many of
us in Alpha, having nothing else in particular to do at
that moment, since in an unusual lapse of authority
Balderson hadn't given his other platoon leaders any
orders, picked out seats on bunkers and sandbagged
walls a respectful distance away, and settled in
to watch.
Out to the north was an old French Rubber Plantation
Mansion with a water tower and it was decided, being
that it was a war after all, that the water tower was
expendable. So, the Locals leveled the mortar's base
plate, estimated the distance and set the mortar's
elevations as instructed, and dropped the first
round down the tube. The round carved a beautiful
arc across the heavens on its way and exploded several
hundred meters short. But not bad really for a first
attempt. The Locals smiled, listened to the Lt.
through the interpreter, corrected, and dropped
another round down the tube. Ah! Better!
Well, unless you were a grunt calling for suppressing
fire on soldiers by the water tower. Both rounds
might have come down behind you and as those of you
who had that happen when you were in field know
(show of hands? one, two, three, ah yes, many of you!
so did I) you would have been on the horn screaming
cease fire, cease fire, cease fire by that time.
But let's not belabor this story.
Anyway, the Locals took to mortars like fish to water.
Pretty soon they marched right up to the tower and then
in a blaze of speed laid down a little barrage of three
rounds. The tower was just a little beyond the range
of this little guy and they couldn't quite get to that
wiley tower although with the shrapnel and all I'm
sure it wasn't going to be holding water again anytime
soon.
Satisfied, the Lt. told them to fire one more round and
then they'd stop. So they did. Well, they almost did.
The round came out of the tube in slow motion, climbed
about ten feet in the air, stopped, and fell to the
ground on its side with a thud behind about five Alpha
Grunts sitting to the sides but in front of the tube
who by this time were pretty relaxed and enjoying
the show.
The Grunts behind the tube, and I'm including the gun
crew of Locals, saw exactly what was going to happen and
before you can say 'Road Runner', we were hugging sweet
mother hill and putting any cover we could find between
us and round 'dud.'
Nothing happened but the thud.
I remember waiting and then raising my head just far enough
to see. There was the round lying on a stack of sandbags,
and, sweet mother of Ireland, there were those Alpha
Grunts, with their backs turned oblivious to the danger,
waiting for the round to explode on target. By this time
others, including the Locals were looking and someone
laughed. The guys with their backs turned, not seeing
an explosion, and now realizing something was wrong,
turned, saw the round, and not a little slow on the draw,
scrambled like maniacs to clear the area. Then we all
started laughing. We laughed and we laughed and we
laughed and the angrier they got the harder we laughed
until finally they smiled and laughed to. Considering
how brutal the last couple of months had been, Art Linkletter
was right, laughter is the best medicine.
When I think back to all the bad things that happened
those many years ago, it does me good to haul out the
good moments and smile at them. I hope it does you, too.
Best wishes all.
John McBride
Alpha, 2nd of the 3rd
April, 1969 to June, 1970
And from Skip - D Troop 17 CAV
I celebrated my 21st birthday in a rice paddy in Nam. (God knows where?). However, as a poor PFC, with little money, and a lousy 1/2 slide 35mm camera, I was glad to be anywhere that I could get some beer, a smoke or two, and a couple buddies.
Mail Call about July 21, 1967, I received a box in the mail from home. My dear (now deceased) Mother sent me a "care package". Inside this rather large box was 9 bottles of BOOZE! They were re-packaged in styrofoam bottles, tightly sealed and taped. About 3 bottles of Whiskey, 3 of Vodka, and 3 of Bourbon!
Here we are in the middle of nowhere, and me and the guys on our track are about 1/2 wacked (screw the 3.2 beer Uncle Sam gave us). We were toasted!
The "First Shirt" walks by as we are totally wacked, and inquires as to what is going on. I gave him a bottle of Bourbon, and never did we hear a further word! My God, what a hangover the next day! But it was worth it! Charlie could have hit us, we wouldn't have known for a week!
Skip Brockner
D Troop, 17th CAV
June 1967 to November 1967
CAX1946@aol.com
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